I'm an atheist, but I like a lot of religious music.
I'm a sucker for just about all early music, including religious. When it comes to modern religious music, I'm less a fan of over the top praise and more into songs that recognize that we still have problems, sort of a musical equivalent of T.S. Eliot's "Journey of the Magi". Art Garfunkel's "Mary Was an Only Child" is a good example (and the segue into "Woyaya" is a brilliant choice). I also like love songs that leave the question open: are they singing about eros or about agape? Foreigner's "I Want To Know What Love Is" is a good example of that.
All that said, I think 3 Blind Mice's "Watchstar" is my very favorite modern religious song. It's beautiful, it doesn't proselytize, and still suggests that perhaps there is some reprieve. The turning of "O Come All Ye Faithful" on its head is well done, and reminiscent of The Bobs' "Yule Man vs. The Anti-Claus" with "Leon the Last"
(as opposed to the first Noel) plotting at the South Pole on June 25th.
I'm an atheist, but I like a lot of religious music.
I'm a sucker for just about all early music, including religious. When it comes to modern religious music, I'm less a fan of over the top praise and more into songs that recognize that we still have problems, sort of a musical equivalent of T.S. Eliot's "Journey of the Magi". Art Garfunkel's "Mary Was an Only Child" is a good example (and the segue into "Woyaya" is a brilliant choice). I also like love songs that leave the question open: are they singing about eros or about agape? Foreigner's "I Want To Know What Love Is" is a good example of that.
All that said, I think 3 Blind Mice's "Watchstar" is my very favorite modern religious song. It's beautiful, it doesn't proselytize, and still suggests that perhaps there is some reprieve. The turning of "O Come All Ye Faithful" on its head is well done, and reminiscent of The Bobs' "Yule Man vs. The Anti-Claus" with "Leon the Last" (as opposed to the first Noel) plotting at the South Pole on June 25th.